In an Age of Experts: The Changing Roles of Professionals in Politics and Public Life / Edition 1

by Steven Brint

Overview

Since the 1960s the number of highly educated professionals in America has grown dramatically. During this time scholars and journalists have described the group as exercising increasing influence over cultural values and public affairs. The rise of this putative "new class" has been greeted with idealistic hope or ideological suspicion on both the right and the left. In an Age of Experts challenges these characterizations, showing that claims about the distinctive politics and values of the professional stratum have been overstated, and that the political preferences of professionals are much more closely linked to those of business owners and executives than has been commonly assumed.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691026077
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	06/02/1996
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	288
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.25(h) x (d)

About the Author

Steven Brint is Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Riverside. He is the coauthor, with Jerome Karabel, of the award-winning study The Diverted Dream: Community Colleges and the Promise of Educational Opportunity in America, 1900-1985.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Ch. 1 Introduction: Professionals and the Character of American Democracy

Pt. 1 The Professional Stratum in America

Ch. 2 Professions as Organization and Status Category

Ch. 3 Professions in the Political Economy I: Spheres and Sectors

Ch. 4 Professions in the Political Economy II: Markets

Ch. 5 Culture and Politics

Ch. 6 The Rhythms of Political Change

Pt. 2 Experts, Intellectuals, and Professionals

Ch. 7 The Influence of Policy Experts

Ch. 8 The Moral Imagination of Intellectuals

Ch. 9 Professionals and Politics in Postindustrial Societies

Ch. 10 Conclusion: The Transformation of the Professional Middle Class and the Future of Intellectuals

Notes

Index

What People are Saying About This

Michele Lamont

Steven Brint offers an exhaustive, systematic, and well-executed analysis of the politics and position of professionals in American society. He provides a very useful synthesis of available knowledge on this group, offers original detailed information on its politics, and addresses important sociological debates.
— Mic&hgrave;ele Lamont, Princeton University

From the Publisher

"Steven Brint offers an exhaustive, systematic, and well-executed analysis of the politics and position of professionals in American society. He provides a very useful synthesis of available knowledge on this group, offers original detailed information on its politics, and addresses important sociological debates."—Mich‘ele Lamont, Princeton University

Editorial Reviews

"Brint's important book ... tackles very large and complex questions about the changing roles of the professions in advanced capitalist societies.... It continues lines of analysis that have been pursued since the classic turn-of-the-century works of sociology, and it does so with great success."

Contemporary Sociology

"Steven Brint offers an exhaustive, systematic, and well-executed analysis of the politics and position of professionals in American society. He provides a very useful synthesis of available knowledge on this group, offers original detailed information on its politics, and addresses important sociological debates."—Mic&hgrave;ele Lamont, Princeton University

From the Publisher